


a spoonful of sugar

by assortedwords



Series: one, ten, ten thousand (a3 week 2019) [5]
Category: A3! (Video Game)
Genre: Character Study, Dessert & Sweets, M/M, Multi, POV Outsider, Polyamory, Relationship Study, so so many
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-30
Updated: 2019-07-30
Packaged: 2020-07-08 00:03:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19860244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/assortedwords/pseuds/assortedwords
Summary: She watches her eldest child fall in love three times over. (Juza and the journey to happiness, through his mom’s eyes. Spoilers all the way through Act 7! Major Act 6 spoilers!)Juza stops crying as he grows up. He stops saying much of anything at all, leaving Nanami at a loss what to do. She doesn’t think he’s shutting them out onpurpose;this seems different from all the horror stories she’s heard, stories about slamming doors and screaming in the heat of the moment. No, Juza seems to contain all his storming inside; he comes home covered in bruises and scrapes, slinks off to his room before anyone talks to him. He doesn’t tell her anything, doesn’t tell Hachirou anything, doesn’t tell Kumon anything. Juza’s always been quiet, but it scares Nanami to not hear him at all, to see him only with downcast eyes and an aura like a rainy day.He’s grown so tall, but when Nanami looks at him like this he only reminds her of a frightened child.





	a spoonful of sugar

**Author's Note:**

> what did i even write

Juza’s second love is acting.

His first love, of course, is sweets. Nanami gets to watch all of it happen, from the first time he tastes anmitsu and every other sweet he comes to love. She watches his eyes sparkle, bats his hands away when they reach greedily for her freshly baked scones, ruffles his hair when he munches on them gleefully. 

“Happy?” she asks him.

Juza nods furiously, his mouth full. Hachirou laughs from across from them.

It doesn’t last.

Trouble comes in bits and pieces, at first. When his answers become shorter as she asks about his day, Nanami assumes he's just growing up the way children do, not wanting to cling to their parents anymore. But it starts to snowball into other things—he starts tugging on her shirt less, starts dragging his feet on the way to school, starts smiling less. Nanami starts to worry more in return.

The first time he comes home with a black eye Nanami’s worry finds its way out in fury.

“Who did this to you?” she demands, her voice nearly a yell. Juza shrinks into himself.

In the end it’s Hachirou who coaxes it out of him while Nanami tries to calm herself down, afraid she’ll boil over if she speaks now. He sits Juza on one of the dining chairs as he goes to make a cold compress, tells him to hold it to his eye, and waits.

“Do you want to tell me what happened?” he asks, crouching down to Juza’s level.

“Tanaka punched me,” Juza says, his voice small.

“Do you know why?”

“He said it was a dare,” Juza mumbles.

“I see,” Hachirou says. Nanami marvels at the way he can keep his voice even. “Do you feel okay?”

Juza pauses. His lower lip starts to tremble and he shakes his head, tears beginning to fill his eyes. He still presses the cold compress to his black eye as he starts to cry, and Hachirou takes it from his hands and gathers him into his arms as he sobs, tiny hiccups that break Nanami’s heart with every choking breath.

“I was scared,” Juza sobs into Hachirou’s shoulder. “I was really scared, I don’t know what I did—”

“Niichan,” Kumon says in distress. He comes closer and tries to stuff himself into the hug, wrapping his tiny arms around where he reaches to Juza’s chest. “Niichan, don’t cry…” 

“It’s okay to if he needs to,” Hachirou says gently, freeing one hand to pat Kumon on the head. “We just need to be there for your niichan, okay?”

“Okay…” Kumon says, unsure. He squeezes Juza, and Juza makes a strangled squawk that could almost be funny if his voice wasn't still choked up, his eye still mottled purple. “I love you, Niichan!”

“That’s right,” Hachirou says. He looks over at Nanami, a question in his eyes. She comes closer cautiously, sinking to her knees next to Juza. 

“Can Mommy join?” she asks quietly.

Juza nods.

“I’m sorry I yelled,” she says, hugging him with more force than necessary. “Does your eye hurt?”

Juza shakes his head and pauses, nods, and his eyes fill up again. Nanami lets him cry into her shoulder.

* * *

  
Juza stops crying as he grows up. He stops saying much of anything at all, leaving Nanami at a loss what to do. She doesn’t think he’s shutting them out on _purpose;_ this seems different from all the horror stories she’s heard, stories about slamming doors and screaming in the heat of the moment. No, Juza seems to contain all his storming inside; he comes home covered in bruises and scrapes, slinks off to his room before anyone talks to him. He doesn’t tell her anything, doesn’t tell Hachirou anything, doesn’t tell Kumon anything. Juza’s always been quiet, but it scares Nanami to not hear him at all, to see him only with downcast eyes and an aura like a rainy day.

He’s grown so tall, but when Nanami looks at him like this he only reminds her of a frightened child.

The acting, then, comes as a relief. Nanami doesn’t know where it comes from, and it's no surprise that Juza doesn’t breathe a word about it either. But Nanami finds crumpled audition flyers on his desk when she cleans his room, play ticket stubs in the pockets of his trousers when she does the laundry, and starts to wonder.

“Your uncle mentioned that Muku’s going to be in a play next week,” Nanami mentions casually over dinner, and watches as Juza stops eating. “I thought we could all go together on Saturday.”

“Muku told me about it!” Kumon says excitedly. “I said I’d definitely go watch!”

“I should be able to make it too,” Hachirou adds on. He takes a sip of water, wondering. “I didn’t think Muku would get into acting. He's always been such a shy kid.”

“Well, people are full of surprises,” Nanami says. She looks over at Juza. “Juza? You think you can make it?”

Juza startles almost violently.

“Niichan?” Kumon asks, concerned. “Are you okay?”

“...I’m fine,” Juza says. “I’m free. I can go.”

So they all go to watch _Water Me!_. It’s a comedy that has Kumon in tears laughing and even Hachirou cracking a smirk, but Juza never stops looking deadly serious, his gaze fixed on Muku. Nanami hasn’t seen him watch in such rapt attention for a long time. He doesn’t look _happy_ —there’s a complicated furrow between his brows still, and his hands are clenched, nails no doubt digging into his palms. But at the very least his eyes are bright once more, the stage reflected in them, and Nanami lets hope steal into her heart.

* * *

  
Despite all the signs, Juza auditioning for MANKAI still comes as a surprise. Nanami's not sure what to make of it at first. Juza is a good boy, an obedient son—she trusts him to be sensible, but it doesn't mean she doesn't _worry_. He's only seventeen years old, after all. She and Hachirou had never planned for him to leave home earlier than he left school. (Or even later than that, considering how housing prices are these days. She digresses.) 

But Juza has never asked for much, even when he was being picked on in school, even when he wants a dessert so badly Nanami can practically see his mouth watering. If he's _asking,_ she thinks, watching him bow, then he must want it more than anything.

“Will it make you happy?” Hachirou asks him.

Juza nods, his head still lowered.

So she and Hachirou agree. All of them insist on helping him pack, make him promise to come home often. Get used to living in a house with a missing piece of their family.  


* * *

  
It's no surprise, then, that Nanami goes all out for the first time he comes home. She holes herself up in the kitchen pouring and measuring and whisking long before anyone else is awake, imagining Juza's eyes lighting up when he comes home and grinning to herself.

Hachirou comes in around nine, still rubbing his eyes when he mumbles a _good morning_. "It's only been a week," he teases when he sees the bowls she's got out, the fruit and sugar and butter lying all around the counters. But he rolls up his sleeves without her asking and comes to stand next to her, watching her melt butter for the cream puffs. "How can I help?"

Kumon bounces in just when Nanami's poured the third portion of sugar into the mochi, and lights up when he sees her readying the daifuku, Hachirou busy with the cream puff mix. "Good morning! Is this for Niichan?"

"Yep!" Nanami says, beckoning him. "Come mix the sugar for me, I have to start on the agar for the anmitsu."

"Okay!"

The house is filled with the warm smell of baking cream puffs when Juza arrives, and the rest of the sweets are just about done as well. "Welcome home," Nanami calls, lifting her head. Hachirou hums the same greeting as he puts the bowls of anmitsu on the table, grinning at the wide-eyed look on Juza’s face. Kumon lights up.

 _"Niiiiiiiii—”_ he yells, dropping everything in his hands onto the kitchen counter with a clatter. “ _—chan!!"_ He flings himself at Juza with no hesitation, absolutely sure Juza will catch him.

"Whoa—"

And Juza does.

“I missed you so much!” Kumon wails, clinging to him like a koala. “I’m gonna watch your play when it’s out and I’m gonna clap the _loudest!”_

“It’s not _my_ play,” Juza says in response. He ruffles Kumon’s hair absentmindedly, looking past his head, and Kumon hums happily. “Look, we still have to set the table.”

The table piles up in no time with three people helping, anmitsu and cream puffs and daifuku, and they sit down to eat. Kumon doesn’t stop chattering the whole way, prodding Juza with questions.

“What’s practice like?” he asks through a mouthful of cream.

“Busy,” Juza says.

“What’s living in the dorms like?”

“Noisy.”

"What's rooming with someone like?"

"Annoying," Juza grumbles into his anmitsu, the first response that hasn’t sounded neutral. Nanami raises an eyebrow in surprise; it's unlike Juza to complain. "…Well, that's mostly because of who I'm rooming with, though."

"The one you mentioned?" Nanami asks.

Juza nods. "Settsu. He's good at everything, but he keeps provoking me."

Nanami's brow furrows. She still remembers that little brat from when Juza was in elementary school, the one that’d broken his arm and blamed it on Juza. Neither she nor Hachirou have ever stopped worrying about the people that seem to see Juza as an easy target, and she hates that she can't control it. "Oh no. Not another one of those people?"

Juza tenses. "It's okay. I won't get into trouble."

It breaks her heart to see his shoulders hunch, like the problem is _him_ instead of everyone else. "That's not what we're worried about," she says instead, patting his shoulder. "Just do your best, okay?"

"I will," Juza says, reaching for the daifuku this time. "Don't worry."

Settsu. That's the first time she hears him by name.

If he lays a finger on Juza again she'll rip him to shreds.

("Don't pick fights with kids," Hachirou says when he sees the look on her face later on, but lets her grumble more threats.)  


* * *

  
Talk of a Taichi comes later, but not by much. A fellow Autumn Troupe member, Nanami learns. A hard worker with a natural stage presence, but doesn’t seem to realize it. These days, Juza seems to only talk about acting, forever a script in hand or earphones plugged into his phone to study with. 

"He goes to O High too," Juza says, munching on shortcake this time. "He kind of follows me around, I guess?"

"Follows you around?" Hachirou asks. Nanami can feel him growing wary, even if his expression stays neutral.

"Like Kumon," Juza explains, too lost in his snack to notice. "I don't really get him."

Neither does Nanami, with a description like that. She exchanges confused looks with Hachirou over Juza's head.

Nanami hasn't met many people from the troupe, so far; all she knows is that she likes Izumi, and she still kind of wants to kick Settsu's ass. She's not entirely sure which category this Taichi falls into, or if it's a different one altogether, but she lets it slide for now.  


* * *

  
A few weeks after Juza joins the troupe, Kumon bursts through the door waving a flyer. “Niichan’s gonna be the second lead!” he yells. 

“Come again?” Hachirou says mildly, looking up from where he’s mopping the floor. One gets used to no-context outbursts with an excitable child.

Kumon hops through the wet floorboards delicately, and slaps the paper he’s waving onto the dinner table. “Look! The first Autumn play!”

Nanami comes closer too. Sure enough, Juza’s on the poster, dressed in a suit and holding a gun. Probably some sort of mobster theme. A part of Nanami instantly turns petty. She knows Juza’s tall, but _honestly_. This again. But the rest of her buzzes with excitement despite that. She wouldn’t miss this for the world. 

“Can we go?” Kumon asks, his eyes shining.

Hachirou looks at Nanami, and back at Kumon with a grin. “When’s opening night?”

  
  
In the end they don’t make it to opening night, but they _do_ manage to grab tickets for the second day.

It’s Nanami’s first time actually setting foot _in_ the theater, despite passing by it often. It’s barely recognizable tonight anyway; the corridors are filled with people chattering to each other as they make their way to their seats, a universe away from the emptiness Nanami used to associate the old theater with.

The three of them pass by the same _Picaresque_ poster on the walls, and Nanami grumbles inwardly. Hachirou laughs at the pout on her face, and rubs the space between her eyebrows as they take their seats. “You’re frowning.”

“Ah,” Nanami says, flustered. Kumon scrambles into the seat between them, his eyes big and round and fixed on the stage already.

Then the lights of the theater dim around them, the curtains open, and Nanami’s swept up into another world. MANKAI might be a new company, but they’re certainly nothing to sneeze at; _Picaresque_ is a dazzling story full of fast-paced action and snappy lines, colourful and emotional. All of Autumn Troupe is dazzling, but Juza shines the brightest for her, swapping between tight anger and regret and desperation even if a part of his awkwardness still lingers. Maybe the most surprising thing is the way he’s standing, his shoulders pulled back, his chin tilted up, his eyes shining. A strange mixture of relief and pride come into Nanami's heart.

When the play ends, all five of them breathless and wide-eyed at the curtain call shouting _thank you_ s and waving, Nanami claps until her palms hurt. Everyone does. The applause brings down the house.  


* * *

  
Time passes by in plays. _Stranger_ has Juza bingeing sci-fi; _Ginji_ has him imitating yakuza speech so often Nanami gets alarmed; _DEAD/UNDEAD_ has him carrying Kumon’s baseball bat day in and out. Each play only has Juza more and more confident, his shoulders unfurling, his voice smoothing into something calmer, the frantic edge taken off of it. It feels like watching life bloom into a withered flower again. It feels like her heart overflowing.

Kumon joins the troupe too, and she gets to watch both of her boys bloom. _First Crush Baseball_ gives her the same feelings she'd had watching _Picaresque_ and more, watching a retelling of Kumon's struggles in play form. She cries at least twice. When it's all over and they can greet the actors as they leave, Nanami grabs Kumon and gives him the biggest hug she can.

When both Muku and Kumon are free for the night they all have the Sakisakas over for a celebratory post-play dinner. Nanami sees that Muku looks brighter too, his head held high and a spring in his step. He talks less about being soup ingredients and vegetables too, which is fantastic, frankly.

“ _First Crush Baseball_ was wonderful,” Nanami tells him, when dinner turns mostly into everyone chatting.

Muku giggles. “Thank you, Auntie,” he says. “We ran into some trouble during rehearsal, but I’m glad it all worked out okay! Kyu-chan was great as the lead!”

“He did well,” Nanami agrees proudly. It’s only politeness that has her not outright gushing over Kumon’s performance. “All of you did. I hope it wasn't too difficult?"

“Ah,” Muku says, his voice turning hesitant. “Well…Kyu-chan felt pressured about being the lead, and Ju-chan and I were worried that his body wouldn’t be able to take it again…” 

“Is that so?” Nanami says. She knows it’s long been dealt with—hell, the _performance_ itself had finished running—but a stab of worry still goes through her. Everyone in their family has a habit of shouldering their burdens instead of sharing them, Nanami no exception, but it still pains her that she wasn’t there to help Kumon through it. 

Her worry must show, because Muku raises his hands up, and Nanami briefly wonders if she was frowning again. “It turned out okay…! Ju-chan and Banri-san both offered to help out if he couldn’t do it, so he had everyone supporting him!”

Nanami blinks. “Settsu?”

"Ju-chan memorized Kumon's lines to be standby just in case! And Banri-san offered to do it too," Muku explains.

"Huh," Nanami says, thoughtfully. And blinks. "Wait, why not just let Juza do it?"

Muku stiffens immediately, and starts making a series of sounds with his mouth that aren't really words at all, just _uh_ and _um_ and _Banri-san and Ju-chan_ and finally _I'm sorry I'm so useless at explaining I'm really nothing more than a washed-up piece of tofu—_

"Tofu's good for you, you know!" Nanami says hastily, deciding to spare him. She nudges at him with her shoulder and picks up a piece from a dish in front of them before he spirals more. "Here, have some!"

Maybe Settsu's not all bad after all, Nanami thinks as Muku settles down with a timid _thank you_ and starts to eat. Maybe.

("But he's still on thin fucking ice," she tells Hachirou later that night, her head on his shoulder as they watch the night news.

Hachirou sips his hot chocolate. "That's fair.")  


* * *

  
Out of the two, she meets Taichi first—from Kumon, surprisingly, when he brings Taichi over to hang out. Taichi has the same innocent charm Juza has, childish and uncalculating, and he carves a space into Nanami's heart right away. He seems like the type that's always moving somehow—leg bouncing, foot tapping, a constant hum of energy. (It's the ADHD and anxiety, she learns later on. And just sort of how Taichi is in general.) 

Nanami makes donuts for the occasion, fluffy and packed with jam. He and Kumon sit around the dining table munching and calling out their compliments to the chef while Nanami dips in and out, grinning.

“Sweet talkers,” she teases as she comes back into the room.

“It’s true!” Taichi protests, the same time Kumon says “Mommy’s food is the _best!”_

They split cleanup duties together when the two of them are done (well, three; Nanami takes one or two donuts too.) It’s quick between all of them, Kumon piling the plates into the sink for Nanami and Taichi wiping the table down.

The two of them keep up the chatter as they move and when they’re done, sitting down at the now-clean table. Taichi rips a piece of tissue paper from somewhere and fidgets with it as he talks, folding this way and that. Nanami watches his fingers smooth down corners and refold another way. The movements are uncertain, but definitely practiced.

"Do you like origami, Taichi?" Nanami asks, wiping the kitchen counter down

"Hm?" Taichi blinks. He looks down at the tissue and laughs. "Oh! Yep!" He lets go of the tissue and lets it settle, the folds relaxing. "I learned how to fold a parrot the other day, so I was trying to see if I remembered~. Didn't have any paper on me, so! This instead!"

"A parrot?" Kumon says. Nanami's curious herself.

"Mmhmm!" Taichi pulls out his phone to show a picture, first Kumon, and then lifting it up so Nanami can see too. The parrot looks terribly complicated to make, two wings that angle away from the body and a little hooked beak, perched on someone's finger.

"Can that really stay on by itself?" Kumon squints.

"It did in the video," Taichi says, pouting. Nanami's immediately endeared. "But I got the proportions wrong when I tried so it just kept falling off!"

"You made the whole thing?!" Kumon says, awed. "That's amazing…"

"Ehehe!" Taichi puts his phone down. "I can show you next time if you like! I bought a new pack of origami paper the other day!"

"Actually, I think we might have some lying around too," Nanami says, thinking. "I'll go take a look."

As it turns out, she’s right. She unearths a barely used pack from the depths of a cupboard, and the three of them sit down at the dining table to try it out. It's been years since Nanami did origami, but Taichi and Kumon insist, offering her the pack. She picks a purple piece of paper. The dishes will just have to wait.

Juza walks in sometime during late afternoon, when the three of them are still busy folding and grumbling about it. "I'm home," he calls, and blinks when he sees them. ("Welcome home!" Nanami and Kumon chorus.) "Taichi, you're still here?"

"Welcome home!" Taichi says, twisting around to face him. "We're doing origami! I guess I kind of got carried away." He laughs, sheepish, and when he speaks again his voice is hesitant. "Sorry, am I intrud—"

"It's fine," Juza says before he even finishes his sentence. "You're not a bother."

Taichi smiles at him. It’s different from the grin Nanami’s seen throughout the afternoon; this one is gentler, softened with trust. "Okay. Thanks." He gestures at the table, where all their half-folded pieces of paper lay scattered across the surface. "Sit down! Do you know origami?"

"…Not really."

"I'll teach you!"

"Join us, Niichan!" 

Juza sits down obligingly. Kumon offers him the pack of paper, and the two of them help him get started. He picks orange.

“What do you want to make?” Taichi asks. Juza shrugs in reply.

“Make a crane with me!” Kumon suggests. He slides Juza the instruction paper, grinning. “Then we can match!”

“Mm,” Juza agrees, looking at the instructions and getting started. A comfortable silence descends on the table as the four of them work on their respective projects. Even Kumon goes quiet, focused on his task.

It goes so quiet, in fact, that Nanami startles to hear a soft laugh. She looks up from her half-finished bunny to see Taichi scooting his chair closer to Juza, and Juza frowning at his paper, his tongue sticking out as he tries to fix it. It’s not getting him anywhere. Taichi's expression turns into the same smile from before, fond.

“Did you get stuck?”

Juza nods, petulant. He unfurls his hands to let Taichi reach into them and look at what he’s done. “This part’s hard!” Taichi says. He fixes Juza's paper easily, smoothing back a few folds and redoing them. Juza lets him without batting an eyelash. 

Watching them, Nanami thinks she understands the comparison to Kumon now. There's the puppy personality, the sunny grin, but above all it's how _easy_ Taichi treats Juza, touching him and smiling and talking to him without any hesitation. It's a relief to see after a lifetime of watching people avoid Juza.

She decides Taichi definitely belongs in the good category.

* * *

  
Juza brings both Taichi and Settsu home one day. _I told them you were baking cookies today and they wanted in_ , he explains when he calls home. _Is it okay?_

"Of course," she says, hoping she keeps her voice neutral. Taichi is a welcome visitor, but Settsu is a different story.

In the end, Settsu—or Banri, as she takes to calling him in the first five minutes they meet—is just as Nanami thought he would be, cocky and bright-eyed like a fox. He hands over his gift like an afterthought when he comes in, and Nanami has to remind herself through her smile that she _can't discipline someone else's child._

Well, it's not the first time Nanami's met an unruly child, so she lets it slide and leaves the three of them to it. She makes cookies this time, crunchy and snappy, a handful of flavours now she has a full house to feed. Banri heaps Juza's plate with the strawberry jam ones as soon as they sit down, Juza’s favourite. Nanami blinks. Maybe there’s more to this Banri kid after all.

"Here, for you," he says haughtily. If he's trying to come off aloof, he's not doing a very good job. "Since you keep buying that strawberry daifuku crap."

" _Ha?_ " Juza snaps. Nanami startles at the way he sounds. She’d grown used to Juza keeping his voice low, scared of spooking people. This sounds more like the Juza she’d seen onstage, stretched to full height, proud and sure. "Get your hands off my plate."

"I'm just saving everyone time," Banri shoots back. "You're going to be reaching in the tray again and again, so we might as well get it over with now."

Juza scowls, moving closer. Nanami’s just about to intervene when Taichi hums and breaks it up easily, swiping a chewy chocolate chip cookie off Banri's plate. "Fighting's a no-no~!"

And just like that, the fight slinks out of Juza's shoulders. Even Banri's grumble sounds more mellow when he pulls Taichi into a loose headlock, pulling a laugh from Taichi. "Who asked you, huh? Give me my fucking cookie back."

"Don't swear in my house," Juza says, his eyes flicking up to Nanami consciously. 

Like old friends, Nanami finds herself thinking. An unlikely fit, but somehow it works.

  
  
Banri and Taichi automatically get up to wash their plates when they're finished, and Nanami instantly likes them more.  


* * *

  
Things change, gradually. Banri and Taichi come more often, sometimes only dropping in, sometimes staying over the whole day, usually after Nanami's cooking like a pair of hungry puppies. Juza talks more about them too, _Settsu likes this game_ or _Taichi showed me this video_ slipping into conversations more and more. Hachirou is the one who notices the way his voice changes when he talks about them, the syllables fonder, a smile tucked underneath them.

“I'm so glad he has friends now,” Nanami sighs when both the boys are upstairs, (presumably) tucked in and asleep for the night.

Hachirou grins. "Well,” he says, cryptic.

“What?” Nanami says suspiciously. “They _are_ friends, you can’t tell me they aren’t.”

“That’s true,” Hachirou agrees. “Don’t worry about it. It’s just a hunch.” 

Nanami squints at him, and he laughs when she tries to shake it out of him. "Nope, my lips are sealed~."  


* * *

  
Juza has them over for a sleepover one weekend. This has never happened. She wonders just what sort of power those two hold over her eldest. (…Well, Juza's never really had friends to ask over, as much as it pains Nanami to think about.)

"I told them you made pancakes for breakfast sometimes and they wouldn't shut up," Juza tells her grumpily. Behind them, Kumon pulls Taichi down the hall to his room, thrilled to have him stay over. Nanami hears Banri follow them, bickering with Kumon the whole way, loud enough for her to hear even in the kitchen with Juza. There’s a lot of yelling that sounds like _don’t come with us, one length!!!_ and _aah_ ing. It’s always lively with Taichi and Banri around.

"I would have made them pancakes even if they hadn't stayed over," Nanami says, amused. She doubts he minds that much—she makes sweets every time they’re over, and he's always guaranteed his fair share. "But it's no bother. Will it be too cramped in your room?"

Juza shakes his head.

Nanami narrows her eyes at him. Juza's room isn't tiny, but it's by no means designed to hold three teenage boys, much less with two of them six feet tall. "I'm sure Kumon wouldn't mind Taichi rooming with him," she says, pushing it a little further.

Another shake. "He said he wanted to stay with us," Juza says. His eyes dart away when Nanami looks at him. 

"Well, alright," Nanami says, letting it go. She doesn't see what could be so bad about being apart for _one night_ , but she remembers being a teenager, how it was imperative she didn't miss a thing. She won't force them. "You know where the spare futons are."  


* * *

  
The rest of the afternoon is uneventful, mostly. The three of them spend the afternoon with Kumon off somewhere, leaving the house nice and easy for Nanami and Hachirou to clean. At least both the boys did their chores before running off.

The four of them come back when Nanami’s making dinner, still chatting and bickering away when they enter the door. Nanami doesn’t think anything’s amiss until she turns around to see Banri and Taichi lingering behind her, their eyes bright.

It’s like running into a pair of spirits. Nanami startles, shooting them a glare by accident. “—Say something next time! You scared me!”

Neither of them bat an eyelash, even before Nanami hastily smooths out her expression. "Sorry!" they chorus.

They're clearly not, but she lets it slide. “It’s alright,” Nanami sighs. They really _are_ like a pair of troublesome spirits. “Then, did you need something?”

“We kind of had a question,” Banri starts. Taichi bounces on the balls of his feet, clearly excited for whatever they’re about to throw at her. "Do you have any baby pictures of Hyodo?"

"Baby pictures?" she asks. "What for?"

"We~ll," Banri says, grinning.

"Juza-san won't show us, so we thought we'd ask you!" Taichi chimes in with an equally mischievous grin.

Well, this definitely sounds like teenage mischief. “They should be in the bottom drawer over there, if you want to get them now,” Nanami tells them. “Just let me put dinner in the oven and I’ll tell you about them.” 

The two of them run off gleefully. What can Nanami say? She never passes up a chance to talk about her boys.

“Got it!” Banri crows. Sure enough, when Nanami looks over she sees the familiar album in Banri’s hands, stuffed full of memories. He plops onto the couch and looks up, meeting Nanami’s gaze. “Auntie, you free now?”

“Yes, yes,” Nanami says, closing the oven door. Maybe rather than spirits, having these two around seem a bit like two more unruly sons. She’s only known them for a little while, but they’d wormed themselves into her heart easily, without her realizing. She sits down next to Banri and takes the album from him, flipping through the plastic pages. “How far back did you two want to go?”

 _“All of it,”_ Banri answers greedily. Taichi nods in agreement.

“I’ll text Kyu-chan!” Taichi adds, whipping out his phone.

“Why not just call for him?” Nanami wonders out loud. Call her old-fashioned, but she really doesn’t see the point texting someone _in the same house_. She could yell his name in two seconds flat and he’d come running, no technology involved. “That way you could get Juza downstairs too, right?"

“That’s the thing,” Banri says, and doesn’t offer any more explanation. Nanami blinks.

Kumon comes tearing into the room in his pyjamas a minute after the text, skidding to a stop just in front of Taichi. “I’m here!” he announces, and happily plops himself on the couch next to Taichi. Hachirou raises an eyebrow at the commotion and wanders over, leaning over the back of the couch.

“Juza’s going to be embarrassed when he finds out,” he notes, putting two and two together as soon as he sees the pictures.

“That’s why we’re doing it,” Banri says shamelessly. 

Well, that solves the texting mystery. Maybe Nanami should mind, but Juza’s dignity is a small price to pay for her to gush. “Should we wait for Juza too?” she asks. “He _is_ the main character, after all.”

“Nope,” Banri says in response, and leans in next to her to look at the album. “Holy shit, was he that tall even as a kid?”

“Yep,” Hachirou says, letting Banri’s language slip past this time, and the bonding experience of the night goes on like that.

Five minutes later Juza comes into the room, his hair down and dripping, a towel looped around his shoulders. "Juza," Nanami scolds, with no heat to it. "What have I said about drying your hair properly? You'll catch a cold like that."

"Ah," Juza says. He pulls the towel up to scrub at his hair carelessly. Nanami supposes it’s good enough. "My bad."

Banri snickers, but it's half-hearted. Nanami catches him staring at Juza before he drops his gaze, a deer caught in the headlights.

Taichi, at least, is more brazen. "You look cool with your hair down, Juza-san!"

Juza tilts his head, dumping the towel over the back of a chair. "You see it all the time though." Despite that he refuses to meet Taichi's gaze, looking to the side and dropping to the album still open on Nanami's lap. "Wait—what are you looking at?"

Here goes. "Banri and Taichi asked about your baby pictures," Nanami says innocently, and Juza bolts to her side so fast his slippers might as well have started smoking.

 _"What,"_ he says.

"That's when you were two," Hachirou says without missing a beat, pointing to one of the pictures. Nanami doesn't stop him. "We got you new clothes and you only let us put them on you after we bribed you with ice cream."

"You haven't changed at all," Taichi observes. Banri gives him a high-five. Juza’s face freezes.

"It's weird seeing Niichan this small," Kumon says, squinting at the pictures.

"Oh, he was adorable," Nanami interjects. "He had the squishiest cheeks, and he let you hug him whenever you wanted."

"Please stop," Juza croaks. 

Banri laughs at the look on his face, merciless. "Not a chance." Taichi pats Juza on the shoulder sympathetically. And squawks when Juza buries his head into his shoulder, defeated.

"Niichan?!" Kumon cries.

"Alright, alright," Nanami says, taking pity on him. She closes the photo album. Taichi and Banri make disgruntled noises, and she ignores them. "That's all we're looking at. It's about time for dinner, anyway." 

_"Thank you,"_ Juza says, with feeling.

* * *

  
Still, when bedtime rolls around she's curious about what they could be up to. There are a handful of old games in Juza’s room, she supposes, and he _does_ have a laptop, but for the most part she doesn’t think there’s _much_ they could do in a cramped room.

Despite that, she's determined not to snoop. But when she gets up to go to the bathroom late at night she hears their voices ring out into the corridor, and it's hard to stop her footsteps from slowing when she passes by Juza's room.

_"Eat this, Ban-chan!"_

_"What the fuck?"_ (Nanami frowns.) _"You're gonna draw four me? What the—how many of these **are there?** How do you have **four of them?!"**_

 _"Sixteen cards, Settsu."_ Juza's voice is quiet compared to the two of them, but Nanami can hear the smile in it. It's a sound that had grown rarer and rarer as he grew up, and even harder to catch now that he'd moved away from home. Nanami holds onto it. _"Draw them."_

 _"I'm gonna make you pay,"_ Banri snarls, and Taichi howls with glee.

 _"I'd like to see you try!"_

She moves on when Juza starts shushing them, reminding them sternly about the thin walls. Her heart feels like the way it had watching Juza stand tall on stage. Overflowing with relief. With her own happiness.  


* * *

  
Juza’s third loves are Taichi and Banri.

This she also doesn't find out til it’s in full bloom, but this time her own obliviousness is to blame. One weekend when Banri and Taichi are due to come over, Nanami wakes up to a faint, metallic crash.

She's not the only one who gets woken up; Hachirou stirs next to her, mumbling. "What's that noise…?"

The aftereffects of raising an athlete; even after Kumon quit the team, the two of them are still forever on high alert for baseball bat accidents. Nanami smiles. "I'll go check. Go back to sleep."

"Mm…"

Nanami lifts the covers and goes to find the source of the sound. The clang of the metal has faded by the time she steps out of the room, but that's okay. She has a hunch. A whirring sound confirms her suspicions as she walks closer to her destination.

And sure enough, when Nanami pushes the door of the kitchen open she finds Juza standing at the counter, electric mixer in one hand, mixing bowl in the other. He whips around to face her, his eyes wide.

"Did I wake you?"

"Don't worry about it," Nanami says, waving him off. She looks over at the counter, messy with butter and sugar laid out, puffs of flour on the countertop. A half-eaten pack of gummy bears. "What are you doing up so early?"

"Um," Juza says. He looks at the mess and back up at her. "…Taichi and Settsu were coming over today, so I thought…"

"You'd make them something?" Nanami finishes for him.

Juza nods self-consciously. "Not just them. I thought I could make something for you and Dad and Kumon too."

Her sons are _so cute_. Nanami reaches up to pat his head, and he scrunches up his face. It doesn't help his case.

Well, back to the situation at hand. She glances at his phone lying on the counter, and squints at the screen. “Neapolitan cake…?”

“Mm," Juza says, nodding. "...I thought everyone could have a flavour they liked that way.”

It’s a reasonable line of thought, if not ambitious for an inexperienced baker. (Unless Juza’s been baking at MANKAI, Nanami’s pretty sure the only baking experience he has is helping her out in the kitchen. And even that had stopped somewhere around high school.) But still, she has to commend the effort. “That’s thoughtful,” she says. “Want help?”

Juza stares at all the different bowls in front of them helplessly. "Please."

Nanami laughs, and starts looking through the recipe. 

Later, after they’ve divided up the batter and all the other procedures a three-flavoured cake requires, they wait for the cake to bake by washing up in the meantime. It's definitely a two-person job, what with the amount of bowls and sticky utensils lying around.

"They're important to you, aren't they?" Nanami says, as she reaches for the tap. "To get up this early and bake sweets for them."

Juza pauses before he answers, steadfastly scrubbing at a bowl. "…Mm.

“...Actually,” Juza says. Nanami looks up at him. The words thud out heavy and hesitant, like pebbles. "We’re…” He stares down at the bowl. “I’m dating both of them.”

Oh.

The running water fills the pause between them.

Suddenly a lot of things make sense.

“Mom?” Juza says.

It’s the nervousness in his voice that brings her back, and when she looks at him, his eyes are wide and worried. _Ah,_ Nanami thinks. _I guess a part of him never really grew up_.

Nanami blinks. "Wait, have you been dating this whole time?"

"…Kind of?" Juza admits. "I didn't know how to tell you and Dad—"

 _"Is this what your father meant,"_ Nanami says, temporarily forgetting to listen to him.

"What?"

“I’ll tell you later,” Nanami says hastily. She turns off the tap and slips her hands out of her dishwashing gloves, turning to him. “Look at me.”

Juza does, and she puts her hands on his shoulders. She wants to ask if Banri and Taichi treat him well, if they make him smile, but she finds that's not the biggest question on her mind.

“Are you happy?” she asks, even if she thinks she knows the answer.

A small smile tugs at Juza’s lips. It makes Nanami think of the first ray of sunshine on a rainy day, a rainbow after a storm.

“Yeah,” he says simply. 

It’s all she could have ever asked for.

**Author's Note:**

> [prompt](https://twitter.com/a3_week) || day 4: family
> 
> apparently when left to my own devices i start writing juza fic. i promise my brain contains more than this (not really)
> 
> UH I WILL TRY TO MAKE THIS END NOTE SHORT but lbr i've never written a short end note in my life. hachirou and nanami are named for exactly the reason you think they are - juza (10), kumon (9), hachirou (8), nanami (7). i got way more attached to hachinana than i thought i would ; w ;
> 
> will said the title made him think of mary poppins but it's actually a esoragoto spiral reference! (waves at the maybe 4 mikagura fans out there) it's got baking metaphors and juza's got a lot of sweet parts he can't see in himself, so it kinda stuck in my head.
> 
> sweets meta! taijuza get jam donuts because they're soft and squishy; banjuza get cookies because they're snappy but still sweet; taichi swipes a chewy cookie from banwi, a usually snappy food turned soft because banwi has a soft spot for him. bantaijuza get neapolitan/tri-flavoured cake because i am a fucking master of subtlety. the rest are either things juchan has mentioned liking in canon or just me being hungry. the venn diagram of these two things are nearly a circle, but you know.
> 
> thank you to my friends for leaving comments and listening to me cry Literally Nonstop over this stupid daikon (juza voice) AZASSU ((check them out! goomba squad: [captain](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohvictor), [emil](https://archiveofourown.org/users/asterions/pseuds/asterions), [will](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kurokeitos); [rill,](https://twitter.com/daskfln) who i wuv and adowe))
> 
> AND FINALLY THANK YOU FOR READING WHATEVER THE HELL THIS FIC IS EVEN I LOST TRACK BY THE THIRD MONTH, LEAVE A COMMENT OR KUDO IF YOU LIKE. i'm on [twitter](https://twitter.com/kurokeltos) if you're into that! see you next fic!!!


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